The interior gel of an aloe vera leaf has been found beneficial in the treatment of burns and other skin injuries as well as an ingredient in various cosmetics and pharmaceuticals. Heretofore, the use of aloe vera leaf gel for the treatment of such skin injuries was substantially limited to treatment in those areas in which the aloe vera plant grows because of the difficulty of commercially harvesting and processing the gel, only, of the aloe vera leaf for shipment to other locales in which the aloe vera plant does not grow.
Accordingly, a need exists for an apparatus by which aloe vera plant leaves may be processed so as to extract and obtain commercial quantities of the aloe vera leaf gel. Although the gel of the aloe vera leaf could be readily squeezed therefrom merely by cutting one end of the leaf and passing the leaf between opposing rolls, the aloe vera leaf gel is disposed in a layer thereof between the opposite side rind panels of the leaf and inwardly of layers of Aloin disposed immediately inwardly of the opposite side outer rind layers of the leaf. Accordingly, inasmuch as the presence of Aloin in the gel to be extracted from an aloe vera leaf is undesirable and the passing of an aloe vera leaf between opposing rolls would not only express the gel from the leaf but also the Aloin from the leaf along with the gel, a relative simple arrangement of opposing pressure rolls may not be used to effectively extract the middle gel layer from an aloe vera leaf.
Examples of various different forms of product processing mechanisms including some of the general structural and operational features of the instant invention are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,670,768, 3,075,236, 3,195,596, 3,760,655 and 3,907,101. However, these previously known processing apparatus are not well suited for extracting only the central gel layer from an aloe vera leaf.